Berthold Laufer

Berthold Laufer (October 11, 1874 – September 13, 1934) was a German anthropologist and historical geographer with an expertise in East Asian languages. The American Museum of Natural History calls him, "one of the most distinguished sinologists of his generation."

Life

Laufer was born in Cologne in Germany to Max and Eugenie Laufer (née Schlesinger). His paternal grandparents Salomon and Johanna Laufer were adherents of the Jewish faith. Laufer had a brother Heinrich (died 10 July 1935) who worked as a physician in Cairo.

Laufer attended the Friedrich Wilhelms Gymnasium from 1884 to 1893. He continued his studies in Berlin (1893–1895), and completed his doctorate in oriental languages at the University of Leipzig in 1897. The following year he emigrated to the United States where he remained until his death. He carried out ethnographic fieldwork on the Amur River and Sakhalin Island during 1898-1899 as part of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition. He was fluent in more than ten non Indo-European languages.

The Division of Anthropology of the American Museum of Natural History webpage on Laufer China Expedition (1901-1904) states that he:

::"led the '' Jacob H. Schiff'' expedition to China where he was to make a comprehensive ethnographic collection and to conduct scholarly research on the history and culture of a sophisticated people that had not yet experienced the industrial transformation. Laufer made an extinsive collection of representative objects used in daily life, agriculture, folk religion, medicine, and in the practice of such crafts as ''printing, bookbinding, carpentry, enamelware, ceramics'', and ''laquerware''. He also collected ''antique bronzes'' and ''Han Dynasty ceramics''. Laufer's interest in the theater led him to make the most extensive collection of Chinese puppets in North America including ''shadow puppets, rod puppets'', and ''glove puppets'' in several regional styles, and to record performances on wax cylinders. The collection also includes ''costumes, musical instruments'', and ''stilts'' for the ''Yang Ko'' folk drama."
On this expedition, he took a famous photo of a man smiling while eating rice.

He worked as assistant in Ethnology at the American Museum of Natural History (1904–1906), became a lecturer in Anthropology and East-Asiatic Languages at Columbia University (1905–1907). The rest of his career he spent at the Field Museum in Chicago. In 1930 Laufer was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in recognition of his research. He served as the president of the History of Science Society in 1932.The History of Science Societ
"The Society: Past Presidents of the History of Science Society"
, accessed 4 December 2013

Laufer died on September 13, 1934, after falling from the 8th floor fire escape of the Chicago Beach Hotel in Chicago, where he lived. He had been recovering from the removal of a tumor at the time, but his widow claimed he was in good spirits, and the Coroner's jury returned an undetermined verdict. He bequeathed his personal library and correspondence, including more than 7,000 volumes in Chinese, to the Field Museum library.

From "Lasting Impressions: Chinese Rubbings from the Field Museum" Brochure (The Field Museum of Chicago):

::''When Berthold Laufer came to The Field Museum in 1908, he was one of the few scholars in America who could speak and write the Chinese language fluently. He made the study of the Chinese language and culture his life's work. "I have come to love the land and the people," he once wrote. "I feel myself to be better and healthier as a Chinese than as a European." As Curator of Asian Ethnology in the Department of Anthropology at the Field, he made two major expeditions to China in 1908 and 1923, and his acquisitions form the core of the Museum's Chinese collections.''

In addition to his studies in Chinese culture as such, Laufer used his knowledge of ancient Chinese writings to shed light on ancient Iran. Very few writings have survived from ancient Iran. Surviving ancient Chinese writings contain valuable information about ancient Iran, which Laufer was the first to study systematically, and which he published as ''Sino-Iranica: Chinese contributions to the history of civilization in ancient Iran, with special reference to the history of cultivated plants and products'' (1919).

In March 2020 the 385 wax cylinders Laufer recorded in Shanghai and Beijing in 1901 and 1902—comprising the earliest sound recordings of Chinese music—were made available to the public by the Indiana University Archives of Traditional Music.link
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List of works

Written in English

* 189
''Ethnological work on the island of Sakhalin''
* 189
''Petroglyphs on the Amoor''
* 190
''Preliminary notes on explorations among the Amoor tribes''
* 190
''The decorative art of the Amur tribes, Volume 7, Part 1''
* 190
''Historical jottings on amber in Asia''
* 190
''The Bird-Chariot in China and Europe''
* 190
''A Plea for the Study of the History of Medicine and Natural Sciences''
* 190
''A theory of the origin of Chinese writing''
* 190
''Note on the introduction of the groundnut into China''
* 190
''The introduction of maize into eastern Asia''

* 190
''The relations of the Chinese to the Philippine Islands''
* 190
''W. W. Newell and the lyrics of Li-T'ai-Po''
* 190
''Origin of Our Dances of Death''
* 190
''The Jonah legend in India''
* 190
''Chinese Pottery of the Han Dynasty''
* 1911 ''Chinese grave-sculptures of the Han period''
* 191
''Jade''
* 191
''King Tsing, the Author of the Nestorian Inscription''
* 191
''Chinese pottery in the Philippines''
* 191
''The Introduction of Vaccination Into the Far East''
* 191
''Fish Symbols in China (Illustrated)''
* 191
''Foreword to "Catalogue of a selection of art objects from the Freer collection exhibited in the new building of the National museum, April 15 to June 15, 1912"''
* 191
''The Chinese Madonna in the Field Museum''
* 191
''Descriptive account of the collection of Chinese, Tibetan, Mongol, and Japanese books in the Newberry Library''
* 191
''Remarks on "Some aspects of North American Archaeology" by Roland B. Dixon (pp.573-574 of American Anthropologist vol.15 Issue 4 ''
* 191
''Notes on Turquois In The East''
* 191
''The Application of the Tibetan Sexagenary Cycle''
* 191
''The Chinese Battle of the Fishes (With Illustration)''
* 191
''The Praying Mantis in Chinese Folklore (Illustrated)''
* 191
''Bird divination among the Tibetans (notes on document Pelliot no 3530, with a study of Tibetan phonology of the ninth century)''
* 191
''Chinese clay figures''
* 191
''Some Fundamental Ideas of Chinese Culture''
* 191
''The diamond''
* 191
''The Eskimo Screw as a Culture-Historical Problem''
* 191
''The Story of the Pinna and the Syrian Lamb''
* 191
''Two Chinese Imperial Jades''
* 191
''Burkhan''
* 191
''Cardan's Suspension in China''
* 191
''Loan-words in Tibetan''
* 191
'' The Nichols Mo-So Manuscript''
* 191
''Concerning the History of Finger-Prints''
* 191
''Moccasins''
* 191
''Origin of the Word Shaman''
* 191
''Religious and artistic thought in ancient China''
* 191
''The Beginnings of Porcelain in China'', 1917
* 191
''The language of the Yüe-chi or Indo-Scythians''
* 191
''The reindeer and its domestication''
* 191
''The Vigesimal and Decimal Systems in the Ainu Numerals: With Some Remarks on Ainu Phonology''
* 191
''Totemic Traces among the Indo-Chinese''
* 191
''Origin of Tibetan Writing''
* 191
''The Chinese Exhibition''
* 191
''Coca and betel-chewing: A query''
* 191
''Sino-Iranica; Chinese contributions to the history of civilization in ancient Iran, with special reference to the history of cultivated plants and products''
* 192
''Multiple Births among the Chinese''
* 192
''The reindeer once more''
* 192
''Sex transformation and hermaphrodites in China''
* 192
''Archaic Chinese bronzes: of the Shang, Chou and Han periods, in the collections of Mr. Parish-Watson''
* 192
''Preface to "Japanese collections : Frank W. Gunsaulus Hall" by Helen C. Gunsaulus''
* 192
''The Chinese gateway''
* 192
''Use of Human Skulls and bones in Tibet''
* 192
''Introduction of tobacco into Europe''
* 192
''Tobacco and its use in Asia''
* 192
''Chinese Baskets''
* 192
''Ivory in China''
* 192
''Ostrich egg-shell cups of Mesopotamia and the Ostrich in ancient and modern times''
* 192
''Ostrich Egg-Shell Cups from Mesopotamia''
* 192
''Agate, archaeology and folklore''

* 192
''Insect-Musicians and Cricket Champions of China''
* 192
''The Giraffe in History and Art''
* 192
''The prehistory of aviation''
* 192
''The prehistory of television''
* 193
''A Chinese-Hebrew Manuscript, a new Source for the History of the Chinese Jews''
* 193
''Geophagy''
* 193
''The early history of felt''
* 193
''Tobacco and its use in Africa''
* 193
''Columbus and Cathay, and the Meaning of America to the Orientalist''
* 193
''Paper and Printing in Ancient China''
* 193
''The domestication of the cormorant in China and Japan''
* 193
''Tobacco in New Guinea''
* 193
''A Defender of the Faith and his Miracles''
* 193
''Sino-American Points of Contact''
* 193
''East and West''
* 193
''Preface to "The races of mankind: an introduction to Chauncey Keep Memorial Hall"
* 193
''The Jehol pagoda model(Field Museum News Vol.4 April 1933 No.4 p.1)''
* 193
''Turtle Island''
* 193
''Chinese Muhammadan bronzes''
* 193
''Etruscans (Field Museum News Vol.5 January 1934 No.1 p.2)''
* 193
''Rare Chinese brush-holder (Field Museum News Vol.5 June 1934 No.6 p.4)''
* 193
''The Chinese imperial gold collection''
* 193
''The Lemon in China and Elsewhere''
* 193
''The Noria or Persian Wheel''
* 193
''The Swing in China''
* 193
''Rye in the Far East and the Asiatic Origin of Our Word Series "Rye"''
* 193
''The American plant migration. The potato''
* 193
''Christian art in China''

Written in French

* 190
''Anneaux nasaux en Chine''
* 191
''The Si-hia language: A Study in Indo-Chinese Philology''
* 191
''La Mandragore''
* 191
''Malabathron''
* 192
''Sanskrit Karketana''

Written in German

* 189
''Blumen, die unter den Tritten von Menschen hervorsprossen''
* 189
''Über eine Gattung mongolischer Volkslieder und ihre Verwandtschaft mit türkischen Liedern''
* 1898-1899 Ueber das va zur. Ein Beitrag zur Phonetik der tibetischen Sprache
''part 1''
https://archive.org/stream/WienerZeitschriftFrDieKundeDesMorgenlandes/bd13#page/n103/mode/2up ''part 2'
''part 3''
* 190
''Skizze der manjurischen Literatur''
* 190
''Zur Geschichte der Brille''

Collections

* ''Kleinere Schriften von Berthold Laufer.'' Hartmut Walravens, editor, ''Sinologica Coloniensia; Ostasiatische Beiträge der Universität zu Köln'', Bde. 2, 7, 13. Franz Steiner, Wiesbaden, 1976-1992 (3 Volumes). A collection of many of his essays and many relevant documents.
*''Sino-Tibetan Studies''. Hartmut Walravens and Lokesh Chandra, eds., 2 Vols., Rakesh Goel, New Delhi, 1987.

Further reading

* Hartmut Walraevens, ''Popular Chinese Music a Century Ago: Berthold Laufer's Legacy'', ''Fontes Artis Musicae'', Vol. 47, 2000, p. 345-352.

References

External links

*


- Objects from Laufer China Expedition 1901-1904 (section Collections Online, option ''Collections Highlights'').


* ttp://www.fieldmuseum.org/research_collections/library/hist_collectors.htm Field Museum Library Special Collections Laufer Materials The Library of the Field Museum contains many of the print materials from Laufer's personal collections
Search the Library Card Catalog

A mixture of Laufer essays, biodiversity bibliographyNational Academy of Sciences Biographical Memoir
€”detailed list of Laufer's published works
Berthold Laufer Papers
- Finding Aid to personal papers and professional records of Berthold Laufer, Curator of Anthropology at the Field Museum of Natural History from 1908 to 1934.

{{DEFAULTSORT:Laufer, Berthold
1874 births
American anthropologists
German emigrants to the United States
American orientalists
19th-century German Jews
Jewish orientalists
Writers from Cologne
Tangutologists
Tibetologists
Columbia University faculty
People associated with the American Museum of Natural History
People associated with the Field Museum of Natural History
German male non-fiction writers
Deaths from falls
1934 deaths